By Cara Leahy, Student Reporter

Richard Diaz Jr.’s digitally-enhanced photograph of an evergreen became a symbol for next year’s Summit conference when his piece took first place in a Summit student art contest.

The annual contest is open to all students, undergraduate and graduate. In fact, Diaz is a senior nontraditional BAS student of gerontology.

“We wanted it to be open to all students,” said Brady Bryce, director of Ministry Events.

The theme for this year’s contest was On the Mountain with God: the Exodus Expedition. Any medium could be used in student entries, as long as it could be submitted digitally.

For the 2009 contest, students were allowed to use anything from the book of Exodus, which inspired Diaz to create something based on the story of Moses.

“I had looked at the contest and read all of Exodus, and I was trying to find something in my collection that fit [the story of] the burning bush,” Diaz said.

Diaz’s photo of a Colorado evergreen was one of two burning bush-themed photographs he submitted, along with 10 additional contest entries.

“I had a close up of an evergreen and started playing around,” Diaz said

The result was a glowing limb with fiery branches, some patches blistering white against the background. Out of nearly 40 entries submitted, this was the piece that stood out of a field of entries Bryce said, “were outstanding.”

Diaz received a monetary prize and spoke about the inspiration for his piece during an awards luncheon March 17.

“The cool thing about the burning bush [is that] Moses receives his call from God on a mountain called Horeb,” Bryce said. “The burning bush is huge because this is where God gives Moses his call and gives him [God’s] name, ‘I AM.'”

This photo, titled Burning Bush One, will be featured on the table of contents for this year’s Summit brochure; however, placement of the winning submission varies from year to year.

This upcoming Summit will be Sep. 20-23 and will explore the idea of the “mountaintop experience.”